(Closed) Is It Possible To Teach Yourself To Live With Less Sleep?

I’m just wondering, has anyone been able to accomplish this? I’m the person who needs their 8 hours (and preferably 9!), but with my 45 minute each way commute to work, working about 9 hours a day, and being in school part time, I’m struggling to find time to work out and work on wedding stuff. I’m not getting home in the evenings until usually 8pm, so with time spent making dinner and eating it, I’m finding myself having to choose between laboriously gluing our STDs, or working out. (And like I need another excuse to not work out!)

So hive, have any of you been able to train yourself to go with less sleep, so you have more time for getting your wedding dress body and working on wedding crafts/planning? Please share your techniques, I’m sure I can’t be the only one out there needing more time in the day!

I think I’ve lived off less than 6 hrs of zzz for the last 10 yrs!! lol!

Plus you could also get a work schedule like mine. Go in at 730 or 7 am. I always find stuff to do at home and end up after cooking, cleaning, trying to squeeze in (if I am ambitious) a workout, walking dogs, and making sure my son is clean and had a bath (boys are dirt magnets!) and all that jazz finding it’s almost midnight and I need to go to zzz.

I have a new work schedule where I have to get up before 6am and I don’t get home until almost 7pm. I was like you where my absolute minimum-for-me-to-function amount of sleep was anywhere from 7.5 to 9 hours. When I get home at the end of an 11 hour day I still have to figure out what to eat, shower and possibly plan some stuff.

It was sooo hard at first, I would get to work and almost fall asleep at my desk every morning. Every night was a constant battle against falling asleep at 8pm with no dinner, no shower, no nothing. The past few months have been alot easier though. I now sleep about 6 hours a night and my body seems to have accepted that schedule. I no longer feel like zonking out at work, or napping when I get home. I also noticed I have more energy thruoghout the day if I eat lighter meals. So in the morning I only eat grits or an egg sandwich. For lunch I try to stick to cheese and fruit and raw veggies. Dinners are more difficult because I eat so close to my bedtime. But I have managed to not stuff myself full too often.

We also cut the cable TV, I find myself with a lot more "spare time" than I did before!

I’m like you, I also don’t get home and eat dinner until after 8pm. For this reason I don’t even bother doing anything during the week. My weekends are my wedding time. If you do want to do things during the week, designate one or two days where you’ll work on wedding related stuff, that way the rest of the week you don’t have to feel guilty.

@ bellenga – your post made me laugh. Gosh, I don’t even know what I’m going to do when I have kids, I’ll be a walking zombie!

@ mskalinin and budgetbeautiful – thanks, good advice. Maybe changing my diet up will help, usually I don’t eat breakfast other than my venti starbucks, and a sandwich for lunch, but I’m always hearing that adding in some yogurt or something in the morning will give you more energy. It’s just the getting out of bed in the morning that I struggle with, my snooze alarm gets hit more times than I’d like to admit! I also like the idea of allocating certain days, like maybe I can set Monday and Wednesday as my workout days and Tuesday and Thursday as my wedding planning days.

calivalley82, i’m a night owl, so it was hard for me to adjust into the "adult" world post college. i had a super hard time getting up….especially since i usually didn’t get home from partying until 4 or 5 in the am….lol. i read an article that was super helpful though. it said to set your alarm for whatever time you need to get up…say 5am. no matter what time you go to bed, just wake up at 5am. eventually, your body clock will adjust and after doing this for some time, you’ll be tired enough at night that you won’t want to stay up. this has been more beneficial than trying to go to bed earlier. it’s just a matter of creating different habits. our bodies can function whichever way we train it. HTH.

Yup, you do get used to less sleep. Your body gets adjusted to a new habit after 3 weeks. When I first started working, I slept 9 hours a night. It was retarded. I couldn’t get anything done! I’ve scaled back to about 7. During college I ran on 5-6 frequently with a power nap occassionally. I’ve trudged in here on 4 hours before and I sleep poorly on top of it all.

You might be surprised at how sleeping less, but adding in healthy habits like working out is a trade off.

Also, I work early. I come in at 630 or 7. If i didn’t have to come in til 9 I think i’d tend to sleep more also.

I finally just set my alarm every day, and go to bed at the same time every night (only a few exceptions!) and I have gotten SO much better at living with about 6.5 hours of sleep. Working and going to school full time definitely sucks!

It does work, but you will be exhausted for the first while. Basically, you need to go to bed and get up at the same time each day (even on weekends, preferably, otherwise you will be VERY tired on Monday), and your body will adjust. I’m dreading the shift work that comes with nursing…I need my sleep!

Persistence and perseverance is key! I am used to about 5 hours of sleep in order to function at 100%. But, a proper diet will definitely help!

As others have said, you must must start your day with something to eat! I am not a huge breakfast person, but I always either eat a piece of fruit, a cup of yogurt, and sometimes I have a bowl of oatmeal if I have time. It really really helps to get you started, and you won’t crash! Also, yogurt helps your body to fight fat, so its a great thing to start eating in the AM. And, its low in fat an calories, and there are so many flavors to choose from…yes!!!

Once your body adjusts to everything, you will feel better, its just the adjustment period – you can do it!

I had newborn twins at home, nursing (pumping before nursing and pumping after) every 2-3 hours (all night, all day long-taking breaks at work and pumping between classes), teaching all day (meaning up at 4:30 to get both boobies pumped, both babies fed, breathing treatments, heart monitors, etc to daycare and myself to work by 7 to be bright eyed and bushy tailed for students at 7:45 and then teaching a full day), then going to class for grad school, home, pump, nurse, dinner, pump, nurse, sleep (sortof).

Things are a bit easier now that my kids are older (they are 5 now), but I am up at 5, they are up at 6, we are out the door at 7, I am at work and on duty at 7:30! Teach a full day, then soccer or gymnastics, church stuff on Wednesday nights, home, twins in the tub, them in bed by 8 if I’m lucky and then I want to fall over, but I’m usually so tired that I can’t sleep…hence the insomnia!

You do get adjusted to less sleep-absolutely!I’ve done the things they suggest to establish good sleep habits (only use bedroom for sleep and sex, keep a regular sleep schedule-even on the weekends-don’t nap) but I think that I got so used to going without sleep when the twins were infants that I have poor sleep habits now. Nothing wakes you up quite like a screaming infant or a toddler throwing up with diarrhea at 2 am!

I did it in college! I think it’s better on short-term basis, but you can train your body to do it if you eat healthy and sleep really well when you are sleeping!

it’s hard to find time for everything, huh? Part of it might just have to be knowing what you should let go of or ask for help with so you’re not working on the wedding too much and missing much-needed sleep.

Oh yes! I work full time at nights and go to school full time. I’m a pro at not sleeping. So is my mom, she works 2 full time jobs and owns her own business. Plus she helps with the wedding and my little brother’s high school football team. When ya start to go to sleep don’t be distracted. Put everything ya need to do the next day on a sheet of paper so you won’t keep thinking of it keeping you awake. Vitamins are good too. I don’t like energy drinks because they have tons of sugar, but I hear 5 hour energy shots are good. Good luck!